I Keep Asking Anyways
by Frenger868
Summary: Never has self destruction seemed so attractive to Sherlock.


I tap the window once, twice. The sound of my fingernail against the glass is drowned out by the midnight thunderstorm, and by the rain blurring the panes into a funhouse mirror. I lean my head forward slowly until it makes a light impact with the window, and close my eyes.

London fades away, and I'm underwater. Any sounds outside my head turns dull and muted, as if it's all so far away. I'm in a different world, where my only concerns are keeping my chin above the water and taking a gulp of breath before my head is pushed under again, starting the struggle over indefinitely. There'll be some violent flailing until I erupt from the water once more to take my allotted breath, and then I'll sink back down into the icy depths. There is only one simple goal: survive. The rest is just transport; all I have to do is live. All I have to do is live, right John?

If only life were that easy, requiring only the physical needs to be met. Deal with the things I can see; bandage a cut, add food to an empty stomach, find a source of heat before I turn white and silent. An obvious cure for every ill; cause and effect as clear as day turning into night.

But life isn't that easy.

There are fears, and insecurities, and illogical behaviour stemming from disordered thoughts that lay in wait, tiny seedlings with the potential to overgrow every crevice of my brain. My mind fighting against my body in a suicidal bid to gain some sort of grip, some sort of handle on life. I seek a direction to make everything less pointless and unknown and uncontrollable.

When survival comes easy, what can calm the primal brain that seeks only to continue living? It goes haywire. Miscomputes. Its job is done, so what is there left to do? Well, there _is_ a life to occupy, and an existence to upkeep. This holds interest, for most.

But what of those that find the daily trawling of life weighty, and meaningless; depressing, and endlessly terrifying?

The brain turns on itself; for fun. To have a point, a direction, to view _something_, anything, in the distance. That point may be far away and forever unreachable, but it will at least remain a constant in a life that is a whirlwind of inconsistencies.

I will self-destruct in the process of trying to reach that point, but I will nonetheless be doing _something_ with my life, and I will know, with a powerful sense of security, how it will end. No second-guessing, no trying only to fail, and no self-worth to upkeep. Just light myself at the stake and watch the flames crawl upwards.

Don't fill the tank in my car, let it run empty and see how far I can get.

Don't fix the leak; let it fill up the house, count how long I can stay underwater.

Light up the stove, wait patiently until it's red and burning, and stick my hand on and leave it there.

Eat all the pills in the cabinet, see what happens, take my chances.

It'll be _fun_. It'll be a distraction from the life that's too scary to live. Choices, once so fraught with complexities and long term effects, become easier and straight-forward.

Don't know what I want to do in life? Don't survey the options, no. Slice my leg open until there is too much blood to feel the pain; make it physical. I have a problem I know how to deal with now. Grab a bandage, grab some disinfectant; all better. More easily dealt with, I gain a sense of _action_ to cancel out the suffocating stagnation that I'm trying to avoid.

I'm suffocating right now, in this tiny room and in this tiny flat, weighed and held in by the crashing waves that turn London into its own body of water. I could float away, riding atop a mini tsunami until I was so lost and so far away from everything I've ever known that I could start over again.

I slam my fist against the glass and let out a sob. There are no tears, no water to slip slyly into my lungs and fill them up. What a mercy that would be. You'd think me melodramatic, I know. But then again, maybe I don't. I never knew for certain with you, John. So many of your actions and words came from absolutely no feasible line of data, and yet they happened anyways. I always tried to hide the questioning look in my eyes from you, but I'm sure I let it slip pass more than a few times.

So what would you say to this, John? What would you say if you saw your fantastic, wonderful, amazing et cetera flatmate crumbling and breaking by will? If you saw me, that brilliant logical detective willingly digging a hole further and further down with each carefully plotted move, waiting until the dirt comes crashing down upon me, trapping me in an early grave. What would you do, stop me? Would you even notice? What would you say, John?

But you're not here to ask, and I can't answer for you. It doesn't matter what you might've said anymore, you're not here. You won't return.

I keep asking anyways.


End file.
